New research shows that the variety of online players is shrinking rapidly, although the overall size of the worldwide web continues to expand and functional and geographic opportunities are rising.
The number of distinctive sources and voices on the internet is proven to be in long-term decline, according to new research.
A paper entitled 'Evolution of diversity and dominance of companies in online activity' published in the PLOS One scientific journal has shown between 60 and 70 per cent of all attention on key social media platforms in different market segments is focused towards just 10 popular domains.
In stark contrast, new competitors are struggling to survive against such dominant players, with just 3 per cent of online domains born in 2015 still active today, compared to nearly 40 per cent of those formed back in 2006.
The researchers say if these were organic lives, the infant mortality rate would be considered a crisis.
Paul X. McCarthy, a co-author of the paper and Adjunct Professor from UNSW Sydney's Engineering faculty, said: "The internet started as a source of innovation, new ideas and inspiration, a technology that opens up the playing field. But it is now becoming a medium that actually stifles competition, promotes monopolies and the dominance of a small number of players.
"The results indicate the end state of many new industries is likely to be more concentrated than in the analogue economy. With a winner-takes-most outcome for many.
"It means that there's not as much natural competition in established domains, for example in retail with Amazon or in music with Spotify. This may lead to non-competitive behaviour by market leaders such as price discrimination and the use of market power to control suppliers and stifle potential future rivals.
"That is why some see a new role for market regulators to step in here."
The research team, which also included Dr Marian-Andrei Rizoiu from UTS, Sina Eghbal from ANU, and Dr Daniel Falster and Xian Gong from UNSW, performed a large-scale longitudinal study to quantify the distribution of attention given in the online environment to competing organisations.
They tallied the number of external links to an organisation's main domain posted on two large social media channels, namely Reddit and Twitter, as a proxy for online attention towards an organisation.
More than 6 billion user
